The government, which was returned to power with a reduced majority after the fires, has promised that the burned forests will be protected, but the WWF's Greece director said he was sceptical.

"We've heard these assurances before, and we've seen that development happen, and that's why... the WWF will be taking on a more active, more aggressive watchdog role in monitoring exactly what is happening and intervening, through legal experts, where that is necessary," Dimitris Karavellas said.

The BBC's Malcolm Brabant in Athens says local government officials in some of the burned areas want to encourage tourist development in order to replace agricultural economies that are now dead or fatally wounded.

They resent what they see as high-minded interference of prosperous city-dwellers, our correspondent says.

But the WWF insists that humans and nature can co-exist as long as there is sensible and sensitive sustainable development.